Good morning. It’s Monday, April 7. Today we are covering:
Nintendo President Doug Bowser on the new Switch 2, tariffs and what's next for the gaming giant
Llama 4: Did Meta just push the panic button?
UK Effort to Keep Apple Encryption Fight Secret Blocked in Court
The AI Race Has Gotten Crowded-and China Is Closing In on the US
On TikTok, YouTube, X, and everywhere, 'views' are lies
Let’s dive in
Nintendo President Doug Bowser on the new Switch 2, tariffs and what's next for the gaming giant
By Teddy Farkas via CNBC
Nintendo has officially unveiled the Switch 2, launching June 5 for $449.99 with a bigger screen, upgraded controllers, and improved speed—up from the original's $300 price tag.
Launch titles include "Mario Kart World," "Donkey Kong Bananza," "Street Fighter 6," "The Duskbloods," and "Kirby Air Riders"; the console retains hybrid handheld-TV functionality.
Preorders are delayed due to Trump's new reciprocal tariffs, with President Doug Bowser also hinting at Nintendo’s broader ambitions in film and entertainment beyond gaming.
𝕏: Doug Bowser on Switch 2 game prices: “What you see right there is variable pricing. We’ll look at each game, really look at the development that’s gone into the game, the breadth and depth of the gameplay, if you will, the durability over time and the repeatability of gameplay experiences… - Wario64 (@Wario64)
Llama 4: Did Meta just push the panic button?
By Nathan Lambert via Interconnects
Meta’s Llama 4 launch—featuring three new sparse mixture-of-experts models (Scout, Maverick, Behemoth)—landed with confusing messaging, odd timing, and mismatched public benchmarks, sparking backlash from open-source communities who once championed the brand.
Despite technical wins like 10M-token context windows and lower compute training via MoE, the release alienates academic and local-run users with massive model sizes, a restrictive license, and lack of support for smaller, deployable variants.
The rushed release and organizational instability at Meta AI, including the departure of its research lead days before launch, suggest internal disarray and raise doubts about Meta’s long-term commitment to open AI leadership.
𝕏: Llama 4 was a messy release: unreleased finetunes boosting scores, rumors of training on test, released on a weekend, etc As (open) models are commoditized / competition grows, what is the role of Meta's Llama efforts in the future? Should they continue? - Nathan Lambert (@natolambert)
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UK Effort to Keep Apple Encryption Fight Secret Blocked in Court
By Ryan Gallagher via Bloomberg
A UK court blocked the government's attempt to keep secret a legal battle with Apple over access to user data, siding with privacy advocates.
The Investigatory Powers Tribunal ruled that the effort to conceal the case posed a “fundamental interference with the principle of open justice.”
The case involves British authorities seeking to bypass Apple’s encryption protections, escalating tensions over surveillance and digital privacy.
𝕏: Important judgment from the Investigatory Powers Tribunal in the case relating to the UK government's reported attempt to obtain "backdoor" encrypted data from Apple devices. Apple is challenging that attempt… - Adam Wagner KC (@AdamWagner1)
The AI Race Has Gotten Crowded-and China Is Closing In on the US
By Will Knight via WIRED
Stanford's 2025 AI Index reveals that the global AI race is intensifying, with China’s DeepSeek-R1 rivaling top US models and outperforming expectations despite US chip restrictions.
The dominance of OpenAI and Google is now challenged by a surge of players including Meta, Anthropic, xAI, and a wave of competitive models emerging from Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, and Southeast Asia.
AI development is becoming more efficient and accessible, with open-weight models like Meta’s Llama 4 and DeepSeek-R1 narrowing the gap with closed systems, while the industry grapples with rising safety concerns, looming data shortages, and record investment of $150.8B in 2024.
𝕏: While the US puts up barriers to the rest of the world, the rest of the world demonstrations that it can offer increasingly competitive AI. Side-note: the Stanford AI index is an excellent, in-depth look at where things stand in AI. - Will Knigh (@willknight)
On TikTok, YouTube, X, and everywhere, 'views' are lies
By David Pierce via The Verge
"Views" across platforms like TikTok, YouTube, X, and Facebook are largely meaningless, as each platform defines a "view" differently—often in ways that wildly inflate engagement without user intent or attention.
Platforms deliberately set low bars (e.g., autoplay, two-second watch time) to boost public-facing metrics, while reserving more accurate engagement data—like actual watch time—for advertisers and internal use.
This inflation benefits platforms by attracting creators and advertisers with artificially high numbers, reinforcing a system where vanity metrics overshadow real value or impact.
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